Yeniseian Research Articles

The Development of Arin kul ‘water’ ~ Kott ûl, Ket ¹u·l’, Yugh ¹ur and Its Typological Background

Abstract This article seeks to demonstrate that prothetic k- in Arin corresponding to a zero onset in the other Yeniseian languages as featured in words like Arin kul ‘water’ ~ Kott ûl, Ket ¹u·l’, Yugh ¹ur reflects a Proto-Yeniseian word-initial consonant *u̯- [w]. Drawing on earlier findings concerning the development of Arin k-, it is argued that Proto-Yeniseian *u̯- developed into Arin k- via an intermediate stage *g(u̯)-, and that *u̯- was partly or completely lost in the other Yeniseian languages. Both the development *u̯- > *g(u̯)- > k- and the loss of *u̯- are backed up by typological evidence.

Nova Turco-Samoiedica

The present paper focuses on the lexical contact between Turkic and Samoyedic and discusses nine new possible Turkic loanwords in Proto-Samoyedic and eight new possible Samoyedic loanwords in Turkic. The introduction offers a modest bibliography of the scattered studies on the subject. Two of the new Turkic loanwords in Proto-Samoyedic suggest that they reached the recipient language through the mediation of Yeniseian languages.

예니세이어파 명사의 격체계 특성

The subject of this study is the case category system of Ket language, the only existing language of the Yeniseian languages. After examining the usage of each case and case marker, we analyzed the singular/plural category, male/non-male category, animate/inanimate binary confrontation structure, which are important standards for the classification of cases of Ket language.
 Ket nouns are first classified into singular and plural, and if singular, they are classified into male/non-male categories, and if plural, they are classified into animate/inanimate categories. The three gender categories for nouns, which are male, female, and neutral, cannot be seen as a morphological difference in nominatives. Gender categories only play a dominant role in genetive case and dative, ablative, benefactive and adessive cases, which are made in basis of genetive case.
 It was found that it is reasonable to view the dative, ablative, benefactive, and adessive, which have binary structure according to male/non-male and animate/inanimate, as a declinable case. Locative, instrumental, abessive and prosecutive have no distinction between male/non-male, animate/inanimate, and they do not change according to the number and gender, so the case markers for these nouns are similar to case suffixes or propositions. As for the vocative, it has a male/female binary structure in singular, but they don’t have any confrontation structure in plural, which is very different from other standards.
 As such, the Ket language system does not have a clear system that appears in Indo-European languages due to the correlation between the confrontational structure of the class, the hierarchy of the class, and the postposition. So the Yeniseian language case system should be viewed as a binary structure, which has a declinable group(nominative, genetive, dative, ablative, benefactive, adessive, vocative) and indeclinable group(locative, instumental, prosecutive, abessive).

Ancient Connections of Sinitic

Six main alternative linkage proposals which involve the Sino-Tibetan family, including Sinitic and other language families of the East Asian area (Miao-Yao, Altaic/Transeurasian, Austroasiatic, Tai-Kadai, Austronesian) are briefly outlined. Using the standard techniques of comparative linguistics, a remote linkage between the Sino-Tibetan languages, including Sinitic, the Yeniseian languages of Siberia, and the Na-Dene languages of northwest North America is demonstrated. This includes cognate core lexicon showing regular sound correspondences, morphological similarities of form and function, as well as similarities in social structure. The other proposals for linkages that connect Sinitic and other languages of the East Asian area appear not to be based on a genetic linguistic relationship but rather due to contact: millennia of loanwords from Sinitic into the languages of those families and some lexicon borrowed into Sinitic. More remains to be done to further document the status of the linkage between Sino-Tibetan and Dene-Yeniseian.

Late Holocene Technology Words in Proto-Athabaskan: Implications for Dene-Yeniseian Culture History

This study will review previously published Proto-Athabaskan (P-A) linguistic reconstructions related to weapons and ceramics technologies present on both sides of the Bering Strait. Na-Dene (N-D) is a large family of indigenous languages of North America, consisting mostly of the Athabaskan languages of the western interior, plus the Eyak and Tlingit languages of the southern Alaska coast. Athabaskan-Eyak (A-E) constitutes a distinct branch of Na-Dene. Dene-Yeniseian (D-Y) is a proposed transpacific family comprised of Na-Dene in addition to the Yeniseian languages of Siberia. Reconstructions pertaining to several specific technologies will be discussed in relation to likely cognates within broader A-E, N-D and D-Y historical contexts. Although D-Y is sometimes assumed to have originated near the conclusion of the Pleistocene Epoch (prior to ~11,500 years BP), this study will refocus fundamental questions on the current Holocene Epoch (after ~11,500 BP), and particularly the Late Holocene (after ~3000 BP).

Towards a New Reconstruction of the Proto-Yeniseian Sound System. Part I: Word-Initial Consonants

Abstract We present correspondence sets involving word-initial consonants and including all known members of the Yeniseian language family. The data can be used for a systematic application of the comparative method, implying both the reconstruction of proto-phonemes and subsequent phylogenetic research questions (intrafamilial subdivisions among the Yeniseian languages according to shared phonological innovations). Key findings include (I) the discovery of an isogloss which separates Ket, Yugh and Pumpokol from Kott, Assan and Arin in terms of word-initial labial and dental plosives (voiced in the former group, voiceless in the other) and (II) the inference that Proto-Yeniseian (PY), i.e., the last common ancestor of all Yeniseian languages, probably had a two-layered system of plain voiced and plain voiceless stops. We do not see evidence for the postulation of lateral affricates. In addition, there are three correspondences of sibilants and uvulars, respectively, but we cannot, as yet, plausibly posit proto-phonemes in these cases.

Siberian-American cognitive and cultural interface through eco-ethnic lexicon

Abstract The focus of this paper is a possible Siberian link with the Na-Dene Languages, based on cognitive lexical semantics. Dene-Yeniseian is a proposed language family consisting of the Yeniseian languages of Central Siberia and the Na-Dene languages of North-Western North America (Campbell 2011; Trombetti 1923; Vajda 2010, 2011, 2018). The paper connects semantic universals, Ket and Dene folklore, and also comparative historical linguistic research. In analyzing a group of cognates, the paper’s aim is to discuss the cultural, cognitive and pragmatic reasons that enabled these cognates to survive for several thousand years. Our main point is that factors such as the relative importance of linguistic signs in a language community, lingual conservatism of semantic universals and the distinctiveness of its referents, probable frequency with which these words were used, and their cultural symbolism in relatively similar environments significantly contributed to their survival in ethnic groups belonging to the proposed language family. Our cross-disciplinary study helps us identify the essential place of eco-ethnic material in interpreting cross-continental similarities and emphasizes the integrative role of culture. It will be argued that the eco-ethnic lexicon reflected by the Dene-Yeniseian cognates reveals several thousand years of diachronic cognitive processes.

Athabaskan–Siberian Folklore Links: In Search of Na-Dene Origins

The North American Na-Dene languages, most of them belonging to the Athabaskan branch, are possibly related to the Yeniseian languages of Siberia. A series of episodes of traditional narratives link the Na-Dene with the Altai-Sayan region. The creators of the Sumnagin culture of eastern and north-eastern Siberia, who possibly reached Alaska in the Early Holocene, seem the most plausible candidates for the proto-Na-Dene speakers, although interpretation of corresponding archaeological materials remains controversial.

Some remarks on Turkic elements of Mongolic origin in Yeniseian

The paper presents some phonetic, morphological and semantic considerations, which characterize the Turkic elements of Mongolic origin in the Yeniseian languages. There are some criteria, which help to distinguish direct and indirect Mongolic loanwords.

Linguistic Phylogenies Support Back-Migration from Beringia to Asia

Recent arguments connecting Na-Dene languages of North America with Yeniseian languages of Siberia have been used to assert proof for the origin of Native Americans in central or western Asia. We apply phylogenetic methods to test support for this hypothesis against an alternative hypothesis that Yeniseian represents a back-migration to Asia from a Beringian ancestral population. We coded a linguistic dataset of typological features and used neighbor-joining network algorithms and Bayesian model comparison based on Bayes factors to test the fit between the data and the linguistic phylogenies modeling two dispersal hypotheses. Our results support that a Dene-Yeniseian connection more likely represents radiation out of Beringia with back-migration into central Asia than a migration from central or western Asia to North America.

Etymological and ethnohistorical aspects of the Yenisei

The paper discusses the background of the different terms used for the river Yenisei in the aboriginal language families of the region: Mongolic, Turkic, Yeniseic, Uralic, and Tungusic. The etymological material allows, in particular, important conclusions to be drawn of the areal interrelationships and chronologies of expansion of the Samoyedic branch of Uralic and the Ewenic branch of Tungusic. The presence of Uralic speakers on the Yenisei predates that of Tungusic speakers by a minimum of two millennia. Both Yeniseic and Turkic also reached the Yenisei earlier than Tungusic.

On the Burushaski-Indo-European hypothesis by I. Čašule

The paper deals with a relatively recent hypothesis, put forward by the scholar I. Casule, according to which the Burushaski language, traditionally considered an isolate, actually belongs to the Indo-European linguistic stock. The authors approach Casule’s hypothesis from the comparative side, evaluating phonological, morphological, and lexical arguments in its favour side by side with the corresponding arguments in favour of the Dene-Caucasian hypothesis, according to which Burushaski forms a separate one-language branch of the vast macrofamily that also includes Na-Dene, Sino-Tibetan, North Caucasian, Basque, and Yeniseian languages. It is concluded that arguments for the Dene-Caucasian status of Burushaski quantitatively override the Indo-European-Burushaski hypothesis by a very large margin; suggested Indo-European connections are either highly unsystematic (when it comes to phonetic correspondences), sporadic and insufficient (in morphology), or practically non-existent (in basic lexicon). Consequently, all of the resemblances between Indo-European and Burushaski must be ascribed to (a) recent contacts between Burushaski and Indo-Aryan languages, (b) chance resemblances, or (c) in a very small number of cases, traces of «ultra-deep» relationship that do not represent exclusively «Indo-European-Burushaski» connections.

Metathesis and Reanalysis in Ket

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt:This article identifies cases where metathesis and reanalysis have left idiosyncratic changes in the morphology of Ket, a critically endangered language of Central Siberia. The analysis reflects ongoing work compiling The Etymological Dictionary of the Yeniseian Languages (Vajda and Werner, in preparation). With fewer than 100 speakers, Ket is the last surviving member of the Yeniseian family and genetically isolated in North Asia. Internal comparative data from three of Ket’s vanished southern relatives, Yugh, Kott, and Assan, along with external comparison with the distantly related Na-Dene family of North America (Vajda 2010), also appear in the article.

The Yeniseian Languages of the 18th Century and Ket and Sino-Tibetan Word Comparisons

The Yeniseian Languages of the 18th Century and Ket and Sino-Tibetan Word Comparisons

Yeniseic diathesis

Yeniseic diathesis

Yeniseic linguistics at the crossroads

Yeniseic linguistics at the crossroads